In honor of Sex Tape, which is sure to be an amazing smash (pun intended?) hit of a film, this Rum & Rom-Coms is honoring the one and only Cameron Diaz. Honestly, I don’t know how I feel about her. Like all of you, I’ve never seen a performance of hers I’ve thought was great. But, for some reason I can’t bring myself to hate her. Perhaps this 2002 film, The Sweetest Thing will do it for me. It’s fortunately on Netflix Instant, as is Gambit (the other rom-com I was debating watching, written by the Coen brothers).
I haven’t seen this film before, but I do remember friends of mine in high school talking about it, and bringing up scenes that were supposedly funny. Apparently, this was supposed to be the rom-com to depict women as “cool” and “chill.” Women are just like the bros! Women do sex jokes, and can be all of the horny. Just like guys can. Weird!
The Sweetest Thing also stars Christina Applegate and Selma Blair, two actresses I like a lot, both more than Cameron Diaz. Jason Bateman is in this, too. The romantic lead, however, is some guy named Thomas Jane.
As for alcohol, I am going to have wine tonight. Some red bottle stuff that belongs to my roommate, and has been in the fridge for a month. I have a feeling it is super expired, so I might die watching this movie. If I do die, and ambulance workers have to barge into my room to get me, please tell them I was watching a more respectable film during my last moments on earth. Something like Citizen Kane or Ernest Goes to Camp.
Okay, so I have my wine (poured in a pasta jar I now use as a cup) ready. Pressing play, and the movie starts with a montage of different guys talking about Christina Walters (Cameron Diaz). All these guys mention what a player she is. She breaks hearts and ruins men’s lives because she’s so hot and fun, but doesn’t ever get into relationships. Okay wait, men are lamenting over a woman only wanting to have sex with them, and not wanting to date them? This movie is already bullshit, but let’s move on. Wow, I didn’t know if I could believe it, but to prove how hot and fun she is we see her dancing up a hill (a hill I recognize, this is definitely set in San Francisco). She’s just happy and dancing up a hill. There isn’t even any music playing. What a free-spirit! She talks to her best friend, Courtney (Christina Applegate), on her cell phone about signing a deal. Wait, Cameron Diaz is hot, fun, AND business? How is this woman real? No wonder these men are so heart-broken.
Now Christina and Courtney meet up with Jane (Selma Blair) who just got dumped by her boyfriend. You can tell she just got dumped because she is eating ice cream and crying. No woman eats ice cream for fun. My go to break-up food is whiskey, but ice cream works too I guess. So they tell her that being too available is wrong. Christina literally says, “Don’t go looking for Mr. Right. Go looking for Mr. Right now.” Okay whoever wrote this claims to be a real adult woman, but I have a feeling this script was written by ten fraternity guys using a pseudonym to conceal their identities. Kind of like Shakespeare.
So to console their heart-broken, emotionally available (aka HUGE IDIOT) friend Jane, the three go clubbing! Courtney is hitting on a guy, and sucking on olives on a stick like it’s a penis. This is something no woman has ever done in real life, and if you are with a woman doing this she is probably not a woman. She is ten fraternity bros hiding under one big bandage dress, pretending to be a woman.
Christina tries to help Jane find a guy to have sex with, but when she tries to pawn her friend off on a random guy, the guy says no thanks. Then Christina and this guy get into a fight. Their cute little argument turns her on, and now Christina is in love with him, because no man has ever argued with her before or something. Also, for a club this joint is very well lit, and the music is played at quite a reasonable level.
Christina complains about “ugh what a jerk” he is to Courtney, and Courtney can see right through the frustration and is all like, wow you sooo like him. Also, other women in the bathroom are touching Courtney’s breasts because they are fake and big. Courtney says Christina is being “bejiggity”, and Christina is all like, “no I’m not bejiggity”, and I’m all like “what the f*ck is bejiggity?” More wine. Now.
Jason Bateman appears as the douchebag bro friend. Oh, but he is literally this main guy’s brother in the film. Yes, he is sporting awful facial hair in case you were wondering. Christina chickens out on hanging out with the guy of her dreams at a hotel for some bachelor party. When she goes home, she has a dream where she’s getting head from him, and he giggles like a schoolboy. He also says he wants to give her head every hour forever and that men don’t like oral sex. Boy, what a dream! Don’t we all wish this was true ladies?! Okay actually, I can’t be sarcastic about this. That would genuinely be perfect. Thennn room service brings ice cream, and get this…it has no calories! “This is what all women dream about,” said the ten fraternity brothers disguised as Nancy Pimental, who wrote this. What really bugs me about this, is it’s doing what so many movies do, where it implies people actually have good dreams. Is it just me, or are most dreams horrible catastrophic events where the worst things imaginable happen, and sometimes you see your dad naked?
Jane ended up hooking up with a guy the night they went clubbin’, and the next day she has to take the dress to the dry-cleaners because it has a huge jizz-stain LOL. This dry cleaner happens to be a family friend, then a whole classroom of kids are on a field trip inside the dry-cleaners, and the teacher is her old third grade teacher who miraculously remembers her. Oh, but that’s not all. Then her priest comes in making this such an awkward experience. Oh the hilarity, I am assuming.
Christina and Courtney are at lunch, discussing how Christina is totally crushing on this guy she spoke to for a total of maybe six minutes. Oh, but it’s hopeless because he lives in some shit town up north and she never got his number blah blah. This movie would not exist if Facebook was around. I would have found that guy in seconds, if I only knew his first name and what city he was born in. I can’t remember what was around in 2002. Think she could have stalked his Live Journal and called it a day?
So Jane joins the girls for lunch, and talks about the guy who gave her the epic jizz stain. They of course, have to talk about his dick. Wait, now they’re going into this weird thing about how they have to tell men how big and pretty dicks are. They’re also pretending random objects on the table are dicks, then literally break into song singing, “You’re too big to fit in here.” FEMINISM IS OFFICIALLY DEAD. This is literally a three-minute song and dance praising how amazing the penis is. Brilliant line in the song includes: “My body is a movie and your penis is the star. Starring your penis.” I’m not mad… I’m disappointed.
This is the saddest attempt at making a rom-com that hey dudes you can totally get into this chick flick stuff because wow girls just talk about how big and fat your dicks are, and let you jizz on their dresses.
Jason Bateman and Peter (the main guy) are playing golf, and Jason talks about some guy getting the word bitch tattooed on his ass. This is important because it sets us up the most perfect transition ever spoken in the history of cinema. “Speaking of bitches, what was up with that girl you met last night?” With this, I have poured my second pasta jar of wine, which I think equals about two and a half actual glasses of wine. The wine bottle is near empty.
So fast-forwarding a bit, Courtney tells Christina they are going to the wedding Peter will be at over the weekend. It’s three hours away. Christina obviously thinks this is crazy but also, YOLO! Sorry, I’m so sorry for saying the Y-word. I mean acronym.
Road trip highlights:
- Maggots are in Courtney’s car.
- Christina doesn’t know what a glory hole is. She sees one in a men’s restroom, peeks in, and is terrified by a penis tip that says “Hello.”
- Jane is back in San Francisco, and her whole story-line in this film is that she has a lot of awkward sex with the jizz-stain guy.
- Belly shirts. Belly shirts, everywhere.
- Courtney is driving, and drops something at her seat. Christina dives down to get it, and it looks like she’s giving Courtney head. This excited a motorcyclist next to them. In his excitement, he gets into an accident and is probably dead. Courtney does not give a f*ck.
- They get to the town and have to buy new outfits for the wedding. Inside the dressing room Christina complains about her “saggy” boobs, and Courtney shakes her non-existent arm fat as if to say she is old and fat. Wow, who knew a girl like me could relate to the woes of thin, gorgeous Hollywood actresses?
- They try on crazy outfits at the dress shop and literally say, “Do we have time for a movie montage?”
- The “movie montage” at this dress shop for some reason has them wearing costumes that are the exact replicas of what Olivia Newton-John wears in the final scene of Grease, as well as exact replicas of the outfit in Flashdance and ’80s Madonna. What? Why?
They show up to the wedding, uninvited, and Parker Posey is the bride. She is freaking out over getting married, and Christina consoles her. Uh-oh turns out it’s not Jason Bateman’s wedding, it’s actually Peter’s wedding! The bride-to-be wants to end it. How fucking convenient. They end their wedding so perfectly both agreeing they don’t love each other and are both totally happy not going through with it.
Christina and Courtney already left the wedding however, and both say they are “tired of the game.” They arrive home and something terrible has happened at the apartment Christina and Jane live in. The police, plus a bunch of people that really shouldn’t be allowed inside, are in the apartment. It’s a bunch of pedestrians and multiple nurses in uniforms from the ’50s. Jane’s tonsils got stuck in her dude’s dick because he has a piercing. Christina tells her to start singing to loosen up her tonsils. This leads everyone in the apartment to break into song. They sing “Dont Want to Close My Eyes” by Aerosmith. It’s funny because all I want to do is close my eyes and ears. To add even more humor to this scene, which I didn’t even think was possible, a rabbi is inside the apartment hugging a Muslim man! Two leather daddies are embracing! There’s also a construction worker and a pizza boy. This might be an amazing new Village People-esque singing group now that I think about it.
It’s three weeks later, and Courtney has found love. Not only that but, she hasn’t had sex with him yet. This apparently means that she really does like him. You see, women who have sex with men early on in a relationship can’t be loved or respected by a man, so they have to hold off on sex if they really want to trap him. I really hate this bullshit logic. I had sex on the first date with the only two serious boyfriends I’ve ever had. Also, some other people. Nevermind, I don’t want to get into this.
Peter, who had an amicable break-up during his wedding reception, travels to San Francisco to find Christina. He shows up at her door step, and they talk. Of course, they are in love but Christina still teases him because she’s a feisty one.
Fast forward to Peter talking about Christina. It sounds like she broke his heart, but then she jumps on the screen and they embrace. The camera pans to a picture of their wedding, with all their friends. Perfect ending. So beautiful. Touching. A truly magical film this was.
This movie managed to do what no other rom-com has been able to make me do, hate an Aerosmith song. Ha, just joking. What I mean to say is, this movie made me mad. Genuinely angry. Like, throw stuff at the TV angry. Sorry fellas, but as “cool” and “chill” as us girls can be, we never break into song about how big your penis is :(
I drank nearly a whole bottle of wine, and yes I am quite drunk. I hate being wine drunk, because I know tomorrow I will have the worst headache in the world. Honestly, though, I needed it to get me through this horrible film. On the drunk scale, The Sweetest Thing gets a 9.5. That’s how awful this garbage film is, and how stupid drunk I had to get in order to finish it without crying. Something I might go do right now anyways.